1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to the field of information handling systems and more specifically, to the installation of heterogeneous operating systems.
2. Description of the Related Art
As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option available to users is information handling systems. An information handling system generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, or other purposes thereby allowing users to take advantage of the value of the information. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements vary between different users or applications, information handling systems may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. The variations in information handling systems allow for information handling systems to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, or global communications. In addition, information handling systems may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and networking systems.
The diversity and amount of data managed by information handling systems continues to grow, driving the need for cost effective, scalable systems that can be quickly and efficiently configured for a wide variety of uses and environments. This need has led to the adoption of build-to-order (BTO) computer systems that are custom-assembled to a customer's specifications from a variety of hardware components. The extended time typically required to configure and implement these systems consumes technical resources, has a negative impact on productivity, and contributes to the system's total cost of ownership (TCO). In particular, the initial loading of the system's operating system (OS) can be time consuming and tedious, especially when multiple operating systems are implemented in a heterogeneous operating environment. For example, new computer systems are generally first configured with their initial hardware components, an operating system is selected for installation, and the appropriate drivers for the hardware components comprising the system are located. In the past, the selected operating system and its related drivers were typically installed from locally-attached, physical media such as floppy disks, CDs, or hard disk drives. This approach required an operator to be physically present to not only load the chosen operating system and drivers, but also to make software configuration choices during the load procedure.
Current solutions to addressing this limitation include the implementation of a pre-execution environment, which allows a computer system to boot over a network connection and load a system image file of a predetermined operating system from a remote source. A pre-execution environment can provide other benefits as well. For example, the Dell Server Assistant (DSA), produced by Dell, Inc., provides the ability to configure redundant arrays of independent disks (RAID) and create a utility partition. DSA also has the ability to provide optimized OEM drivers that support installation of different operating systems from a single media image. As a result, time is saved since administrators do not need to be physically present at individual computers to monitor installation and boot from physical media.
However, currently emerging technologies are imposing new challenges to achieving a uniform, unattended process for installing heterogeneous operating systems such as Linux, Novell Netware, and Microsoft Windows. For example, the Windows Vista operating system uses a proprietary Boot Configuration Data (BCD) format, which provides data to the Windows boot manager to load the operating system. The Windows Vista operating system also uses Windows Imaging (WIM), a proprietary, file-based disk image format that stores the main components of the operating system in compressed form. During installation, the image file is decompressed and copied in-whole to the target system as opposed to prior versions of Windows, which were installed file by file in an iterative process. Even more challenging is when different installation procedures are required to load more than one operating system on a system, such as in a dual-boot configuration. These challenges are not limited to DSA. Other vendors face similar challenges in providing a uniform and common installation solution for heterogeneous operating systems.